Destiny
by gabriel blessing
Summary: An old fic, from back in the 90's. Not everyone who fights fate loses, not everyone who loses is lost. A love story between Haruka Ten'ou and Ranma Saotome


"Destiny"

New Authors Note: This is another one of my old favorites that I wrote. I particularly like the way it moves from the clichés involving Haruka and Setsuna. Also, during the dating, I had fun writing the brief snap shot scenes and cramming in as much amusing detail as I could. The point of those scenes are to really picture it, and the mental images are meant to be amusingly improbable

Chapter 1

Disclaimer. Don't own em. Nope.

Author's note: This story is written from Haruka Ten'ou's point of view.

Ever since I was really little, I knew I had a destiny. How do you know if you have a destiny? Well, you can't really describe it. It's like knowing that you have two arms and two hands and two legs. You just feel it. When I was a kid I thought everyone had it. I mean, it just felt so natural to me I thought it must be something that everyone feels.

I didn't find out till I was in elementary school that I was different. It wasn't like I did something that made me stick out from everyone else. Well, that's not true. I was always better in sports, and got better grades then most, but not too much. Just like I was gifted. Anyway, I didn't find out till I was in elementary school that I was different like that.

-----

"Now kids," the teacher said. "I want you all to sit in a big circle. Come on now." The class moved to comply. Thirty little children scampered around the room, giggling and poking each other as they did so. The teacher struggled valiantly against the maturity factor of so many little kids, and slowly began to win out, reducing the inferno of chaos to a more manageable burn.

"Ewww!" one little boy whispered to another. "Don't touch her. She has cooties!"

"I do not," said a little girl with blond hair. Haruka. "I'll beat you up if you say that again!" she declared cutely. The boy stuck out his tongue at her.

"Now, now," the teacher interrupted. "Play nice! I want you all to take turns, going around the circle, to tell me what you want to be when you grow up. Shinji, would you like to go first?"

As little Shinji, who happens to be the boy that had just been warning the others about cooties, stands up and proudly proclaims that he would like to be a doggie when he grows up, little Haruka looks confused.

"What does she mean by what I'm going to be when I grow up?" she whispers to a little girl sitting next to her.

"When you're a big kid!" the girl responds promptly. "I'm going to be a princess!"

"When I'm a big kid?" little Haruka asked. "But...Don't you already know?"

"Of course, stupid," the girl tells her plainly. "I'm going to be a princess, or a Barbie doll! What are you going to be?"

"I-I'm," little Haruka stutters. "I-I'm going to be..."

----

I knew I was going to be something. I just didn't realize till later what it was precisely. At such a young age I didn't even know what the word 'destiny' meant. When I found out I was different, I got kind of sad. Nobody likes to find out that they're different, especially little kids. That's why I always get really upset when other kids make fun of little Hotaru. It pisses me off, to see her knowing she's different and letting other kids use that as an excuse to ostracize her.

Anyway. It wasn't on that precise day that I met him. It was a couple of days later. I was still feeling pretty down and depressed from my little self discovery. I had been moping for a couple of days, and then I met him and everything changed.

----

A bell rings, and it is instantly greeted by the cheering of nearly ninety little second graders split up over four rooms.

"RECESS! Yea!" Like a wave of gremlins, the children pour out of their classrooms and through a convenient pair of double doors located right next to the pod of classrooms. The teachers inside take a collective breath and reach for their respective jars of headache relievers. Except for the one who had been unlucky enough to draw the short straw and had to look after the crowd of children.

The kids split up into groups, some going for the swings, others for the slide, some for the jump rope, and others for various chalk outlines on the pavement to play nonsensical games where the rules change in whatever way they need to for you to win.

In one corner of the playground, under a sprawling lane of monkey bars surrounded by rubber mulch, a little blond girl sits and pouts. A couple of kids shout to her.

"Hey, Haruka! Want to play with me?"

"No, no. Play with me Haruka?"

The little girl ignores them, staring at the ground, and eventually the kids that want to play with her shrug and run off, indulging in the short attention span of second graders. The little girl just sits there, feeling sorry for herself.

As little Haruka continues to sit there, suddenly a chip of the rubber mulch bounces off of her head. She flinches, sitting up straight, and looking around for where it had come from. Another one bounces of her head, and she stands up, getting angry.

"Hey!" she yells, spinning around. "Who's throwing that stuff at me? You better stop it or I'll beat you up!" She stops spinning and puts her hands on her hips, pouting cutely. Suddenly her eyes cross as five little chips bounce right on her nose in rapid succession. Little Haruka flinches backwards, and falls on her butt. She looks like she's about to start crying, when suddenly she hears someone laughing. Looking in the only place she hadn't looked earlier, up, she sees him. He's hanging from the monkey bars by his feet wearing a version of the school uniform with the shirt died red, and he has a little pigtail sticking out behind him.

"Hehehehe!" he giggles. "Got ya!"

Little Haruka's face turns bright red, and she stops acting like she's about to cry, and gets mad instead. "Why you!"

She attacks him, knocking him off of the monkey bars. A little dust cloud forms around the wrestling match

---

He won of course. I used to get into fights all the time, back when I was a little kid. I usually won them too. Except for any match I got into with that little kid. Ranma. He was unbelievable. We would always get all dirty, with our clothes all messed up and ripped. I would get mad about it, but he would always come out of the fights grinning and joking. I didn't have any classes with him, except for lunch and recess, but whenever those two came around, I would instantly look him up and attack him.

---

Little Ranma is sitting under a tree, with a lunchbox open, rubbing his hands together gleefully. Little Haruka is sneaking up on him from behind. Just as she jumps at him, he bends over to grab his chopsticks. Haruka goes flying over his shoulder, and lands on her face on the ground next to him. Ranma looks over at her, surprised.

"Hello Haruka!" he says happily. "Want some of my pickles?" Haruka gets off of the ground, grumbling and brushing herself off. In one of her hands, throughout the entire attack, is a little bag with her lunchbox in it. The two sit together and begin to eat, while Haruka yells at Ranma, and Ranma answers Haruka cheerfully.

-

Little Ranma is on the top of the slide. Behind him, on the plastic jungle gym equipment that connects the slide to the ground, is little Haruka. She walks on her tip-toes, and when she gets right behind Ranma she attacks, jumping at him. Right before she hits, Ranma bends over to pick something off of the ground. Ranma straightens up from where he had found a dime, and looks around. A sweat drop forms as he looks down the slide to see Haruka planted face first on the ground right at the bottom of the slide, both of her hands held up in the traditional warding gesture (the fore and middle fingers tucked in with the thumb, while the pointer and pinkie are extended all the way)

----

Despite all my attempts to beat him up, Ranma stayed cheerful. It was kind of scary how he always came out of things smiling. He was either totally clueless as to the fact that I was trying to beat him up, or he was the nicest guy in the world. I guess that's why, when he told me a week after we met, I was kind of sad to see him go.

---

"What! Y-y-you're leaving!" Little Haruka shouts. She's holding Little Ranma by the collar and shaking him around like a doll. His fingers are extending in the traditional warding gesture.

"My dad says its time to move on!" he manages to get out. His voice gets softer and louder, depending on where he is on the arc of where Haruka is shaking him.

Little Haruka stops shaking little Ranma around, but refuses to let of his shirt. He lays, half on the ground and half supported by Haruka as his eyes spin in little descending circles. Haruka starts to sniffle.

"WAHHH!" she starts crying. She hugs Ranma around the neck, holding so tightly that his face starts to turn blue, as he presents the warding gesture again. "I'm going to miss you!"

---

And that's when he left. Looking back on it now, it's kind of nice how he showed up and completely distracted me from feeling sorry for myself, but back then I was so angry at him. I was either angry because he could beat me so easily, or angry for leaving me. Either way, I got over my depression.

After he left, I started my little experience hopping. With him gone, I could feel the strange knowledge in me, that weird feeling that no one else around me seemed to feel. I hid it from everyone else, and tried to distract myself, but it was always there. Finally, when I was in fourth grade, I discovered what it was.

---

A slightly older than earlier Haruka sits at a desk, hunched over a book she was reading. Surrounding her, all at their own desks are the rest of her class. They also sit hunched over their books. The real difference is the size of their books. While Haruka sits quietly reading two hundred page short story that would be better suited for an eight grader or so, the rest of her classmates are all holding skinny little books that with goofy pictures in them. All of them except for a quiet little girl with funny colored hair. She also has a larger book, though it is different from Haruka's.

As Haruka slowly and painfully traces her eyes over the words, she finds one that she doesn't really know. 'Destiny'. She reaches into her desk, and pulls out a scraggily little paper back dictionary. She flips it open, thumbing through the pages quickly, until she comes to the page she wants. She sits for a second, reading the definition, and then her eyes widen. The book slips from her fingers, smacking the desk. The noise is sudden and loud in the quiet classroom, and everyone turns to look at the blond, but she doesn't notice. Her mouth moves quietly, shaping a word without vocalizing it. And then she nods in understanding.

---

Now that I knew what what I felt was, I could begin to feel something besides confusion for it. I...I didn't like it. In fact, it pissed me off royally. Why? Why did I had to be different from everyone else? Why did I have to be some kind of freak?

I started doing things. It didn't matter what, because I would always do them well, but I did them anyway. I started running on a track team, or playing the piano, or even fighting. The last one made me grin, thinking that the next time I ran into that Ranma kid, WHAM! But none of them could hold me. They just didn't matter that much, and after a while, I would begin to get a feeling like 'this is not me, this is not who I am'. I would move on. That's when I discovered racing. I didn't do much of it back when I was in elementary school, but I could still watch it. It captivated me. I began to think, 'if I could move that fast, then no one could ever catch me, or make me do anything I didn't want to'. That's when I began to really excel at running and stuff. I would always imagine my destiny behind me while I was running, or in front of me while I was fighting. And I would run away from it, or defeat it. But when I stopped running, or stopped fighting, I could feel it coming back to me.

Then, right after I got out of elementary school, and was just entering middle school (around sixth grade), he came back.

---

"For the last time, Shinji," a middle school sized Haruka calmly tells a young man with messed up brown hair and acne. "I'll think about it." Haruka turns away from the devastated boy who had been hoping for a date, and begins to walk away, out of the school. It was lunch time, on a semi-cool fall day. A light breeze tosses the first of the red and brown leaves in little swirls across the school grounds. Other students are all over the place, some eating and others talking.

"Geez," an twelve year old Haruka mutters to herself. "How many times do you got to tell them no?" She nods to a fellow female student with aquamarine colored hair and a nice smile, both of them wearing school uniform skirts and blouses, as she moves towards her usual spot. She brushes back a strand of her short blond hair to where it had been before a breeze pushed it aside. Then she stops in her tracks and puts her fists on her hips. There was someone sitting in her lunch spot! Right under the tree where she's always eaten, ever since she was a kid! She begins to loose her cool at the very thought. She'd show whoever was stupid enough to sit in her spot a thing or two.

"Excuse me!" she called imperiously, marching up to in front of the boy. He had his face down and was snoring slightly. Next to him lay the shattered remains of what might have been a lunch. He stayed asleep. Haruka's face turns red as she struggled to keep herself from losing her temper. "I said..." she takes a real deep breath, and gets right next to the boy's ear, "EXCUSE ME!"

"It wasn't me!" the boy shouted, on his feet and acting so fast that Haruka could barely follow him. A second later the boy had calmed down enough to look around, and turns back to Haruka. "Hey! What's the big idea, waking me up like that?! This is where I always used to eat! You can't try to kick me out like that..." He trails off as Haruka looks confused.

"Where you always used to eat? But I've always eaten here. Ever since I was in second grade with..." she trails off, and stares at the boy. Let's see: a pigtail, red shirt, shattered lunch... "Ranma?" Haruka asked.

"Yea, that's me. Ranma Saotome. How did ya know?" he asked, looking confused.

"Ranma! It's me. Haruka!" she declared. Yea! He's back. It's been so long since...

"Naw," Ranma says dismissively. "The Haruka I know was a boy. You can't be him."

Haruka's eye starts to twitch. "You thought I was a boy?"

"We used to wrestle around all the time. He wasn't much good at it, but that didn't stop him from giving it a shot."

Haruka's other eye starts to twitch simultaneously. "You thought I was a boy?"

"Yup, old buddy Haruka. One of the guys," Ranma nods.

"DOES THIS LOOK LIKE A GUY TO YOU!?" Haruka shouts, dropping her lunch and tearing open her shirt. Underneath is a white training bra. Ranma gives her the once over.

"Well, you're flat as one," he points out.

"DIE!!" Haruka shouts, and the two of them start to fight, rolling around on the ground with Haruka's shirt open as the rest of the student body begins to watch.

----

Not my best moment, I'll be honest. However, apparently Ranma recognized me from my technique during the fight, so he accepted me as his old friend Haruka. He had one of my classes then, gym, in the afternoon. Our teacher was teaching the class some basic martial arts, and I had jumped on this as an opportunity to show Ranma who was the better fighter now, somehow completely ignoring the fact that he won our impromptu wrestling at lunch. (Truth be told, I still blush sometimes thinking about that. Tearing open my own shirt, geez.)

---

"Now," the teacher says. "Who'd like to spar first?" A twelve year olds Haruka's arm shoots up.

"Me an' Ranma!" she shouts. She ignores the teacher as he grows a sweat drop, and jumps up. She's wearing a standard gym uniform, black shorts and a red t-shirt, and she looks over at where her opponent is still sitting.

Ranma is still sitting down, dressed in a uniform like Haruka's, fast asleep. Haruka does a crashing face fault, but quickly recovers. Grabbing the snoring boy by his arm and dragging him onto the mats, she stands him up and moves to stand opposite him.

"Start the fight!" she tells the teacher over her shoulder.

"Shouldn't you wait till he's awake..."

"DO IT!" Haruka screams as her head expands to seven times its original size and her mouth takes up three fourths of her face. The teacher eeps something that sounds like 'go', and Haruka attacks!

Her fist comes flying at Ranma, who takes that moment to throw up his arms and yawn. As his arm goes up over his head in a stretch, still asleep, it catches Haruka's arm and sends her flipping over onto the mat. Ranma comes all the way awake, and when he finds himself standing up on the mats, he looks around and finds Haruka planted face first on the ground behind him, her fingers once more extended in warding gestures. He sweat drops.

---

I still don't know if he planned that. Afterwards, we met after school. I tried to yell at him, but he cheerfully ignored my shouts and walked me home anyway.

It was nice to have him back.

The next day he met me before school at my fence and walked me there again.

---

"I hate you! You're such a jerk! Where do you get off, coming to meet me in the morning like that? Do you think you're going to just beat me up again?" A twelve year old Haruka shouts at a twelve year old Ranma. She continues this litany all up and down the street, with Ranma grinning and whistling cheerfully as he walked next to her. When they reach the front gate she starts to storm on ahead, shouting, "I can't stand you, why can't you leave me alone, you..."

"Hey Haruka," Ranma breaks in calmly.

"Yes?" she asks just as calmly, as though she hadn't just been shouting at him.

"You dropped your pencil." He hands back the writing utensil, and she nods her thanks at him.

"Same place at lunch?" she asked.

"Yup," he answers.

The two of them go their separate ways calmly.

The rest of the school that had been watching collectively face faults.

---

I don't really know how he did it, but he always managed to make me shout at him. I was never really mad at him, and I'm not usually the shouting kind of person. Most of the time I'm very serious and calm. Unflappable. But whenever he was around, WHAM. The volume would jump up. The really funny thing is that he never seemed to mind.

I guess it must have been the kindergarten hair syndrome. What's that? Well in kindergarten, when you liked a kid, you'd pull their hair and call them names. That seemed to describe Ranma and my relation perfectly. It wasn't much of a surprise to either of us when I asked him out.

---

"I can't believe how mean you are! Where do you get off being such a jerk!" Twelve year old Ranma eats his lunch calmly (i.e. supersonic speeds) while Haruka takes bites between her shouts.

"It makes you so mad when you do things like that! You want to come over to my house to watch a movie?! You're such a jerk!" she shouts, not missing a beat while she yells.

"Sure," he answers cheerfully. "Will there be food?"

"Is that all you think about, food? I can't believe how self-centered you are! Yes, I'll order pizza, you jerk!"

"How about eight o'clockish?"

"Sounds just great to me, you stupid pig!" she continues her shouting at him, and he continues to cheerfully grin.

---

It had taken a lot of steeling myself up to ask him that. I was still young, and unsure of myself. I had sweated and stayed awake trying to think of the perfect way to do it. In the end I deviated from the plan, and it worked out alright anyway. I was nervous for a couple of reasons. One of them was that it had been my first time to ask anyone out, and the first time is scary for everyone. Another reason was because of my destiny. I mentioned earlier that having a destiny is like having arms or legs. You know its there, and you can feel it like a limb. Well, just like how your limbs hurt every once in a while, so does

that feeling of destiny. It had started to feel...Well I can't really describe how it felt. It was kind of like it was swelling, or throbbing. It was really weird. Anyway, I was nervous about inviting him over, because when I did, my destiny started to feel stronger.

Anyway, I was naturally really nervous about all of this. I mean, it was the first time I've had anything resembling a date (Mainly because I always turned the other guys down). I spent about an hour getting ready, choosing the right clothes, getting a romantic movie, ect. Naturally, him on the other hand...

---

"What's up? Am I early?" Ranma asks cheerfully. He's covered in dirt, with some twigs in his hair, and wearing a dirty training uniform.

Haruka, who is wearing a pink spaghetti string tank top with a long plaid skirt, starts to develop a twitch in her right eye.

---

The night went of in a predictable fashion...

"SCARF. CHOMP. CHEW-CHEW," Ranma shoves another entire piece of pizza into his mouth and chews loudly, somehow managing to avoid spraying pizza sauce everywhere.

"QUIT HOGGING THE PIZZA!" Haruka yells, developing a twitch in her left eye as well.

-

"So...I don't get it. What's going on?" twelve year old Ranma asks. He and Haruka are sitting on one end of the couch. Haruka scoots a little closer to him, and he scoots a little farther away without realizing it.

"You see, she's in love with him, but he doesn't realize it," she explained. She scoots a little closer, and he scoots a little farther away.

"Why? He doesn't seem like that nice of a guy," he points out. Haruka scoots a little closer, Ranma scoots a little farther away.

"Well, that's what the whole movie was about. Weren't you paying attention?" Haruka scoots a little closer, and Ranma scoots a little farther away. He's now pinned against the arm rest of the chair.

"Not really. What's going on again?" Ranma asks. Haruka's eyes start twitching again.

"At least he can't scoot any further away," she mutters to herself as she moves a bit closer.

"I'm hungry," Ranma proclaims. "Do we have any more pizza?"

Haruka performs a flying face fault. Ranma looks down, finding Haruka planted firmly on her face on the ground, both legs sticking straight up in the air (her skirt somehow staying up so that her legs are fully covered, preserving her modesty) and with both hands presenting warding gestures. Ranma grows a sweat drop.

"Ranma?" her voice comes out, muffled from her being on her face.

"Umm, yea?" he asks.

"DIE!" she screams, suddenly jumping at him.

-

Ranma is lying on his stomach on the couch. His feet are sticking up over the back, and his arms are paused in what looks like a clawing motion on the ground. Straddling his back is Haruka. Her skirt has a big rip in it, and her tank top is all askew. She has both hands wrapped around Ranma's neck, like she's strangling him. The both of them are perfectly still watching the T.V. On the T.V. is one of Haruka's racing tape, with cars zooming around the track.

"This is pretty neat," Ranma says.

"Yea. There's this big car crash in a second," Haruka says.

"Cool."

---

...and I had a great time.

Naturally, I invited him over the next day...

---

Ranma is clinging to a ceiling fan, spinning in circles madly. His head is rotating around with the fan, his view locked on the T.V. Underneath him, holding a baseball bat apparently in mid swing is Haruka. Her eyes are also locked on T.V. The room around them is utterly decimated. On the T.V. is one of Haruka's old dirt bike racing tapes.

---

...and the day after that...

---

Ranma is lying on his back. One of his feet is up in the air, planted in Haruka's stomach. Haruka is currently balanced on his foot, her legs up in the air, frozen in mid wave. Her hands are wrapped around his neck, trying to strangle him again, and his hands are on hers, half way through prying them off.

The two of them are frozen, staring at the T.V., apparently having forgotten that they were fighting a moment ago. On the T.V. is a martial arts film.

---

...until finally we found a movie we could agree on.

---

Haruka and Ranma are sitting next to each other on the couch. Ranma is stretched out, with his head lolling backwards. Haruka is leaning against his shoulder, her mouth open and a little stream of drool coming out and pooling on her shirt. They are both fast asleep. On the T.V. is Shakespeare's 'Othello'.

---

We had a lot of fun together.

I mentioned earlier that I hated the idea of destiny, of not having a choice in things. I also mentioned that I could feel my destiny really strongly around Ranma. The thing was, around Ranma, I didn't mind that part of my destiny. It felt like my destiny had different parts of it. Facets, like a giant diamond. And while I might have hated the other facets, the one that involved Ranma I enjoyed a lot.

Finally, after a couple of days, I let something slip that changed things.

---

Ranma and Haruka are slouched on the couch, their backs supporting each other. The room around them is utterly decimated. Haruka is panting and sweating, while wearing a pair of short shorts with a floral pattern on them and a shirt with a race car on it. Ranma is enjoying the movie while wearing his rumpled school uniform. On the T.V. is a martial arts/comedy film (like a Jackie Chan film).

As the movie goes on, Haruka shoots glares at Ranma over her shoulder. Slowly, however, as her breath evens out her looks turn more and more gentle. Finally she's smiling at him cutely. Ranma of course is totally clueless of the looks. This makes her glare a bit, before finally settling on a crafty look. She turns suddenly, and Ranma falls backwards with a start. She wraps her arms around his back in a hug. He tries to escape for a second, and then seems to realize that she's not trying to kill him.

"This is destiny," twelve year old Haruka tells twelve year old Ranma. Twelve year old Ranma's eyes widen.

---

I was still young at the time, and full of romantic ideals. I thought that a confession like that would turn Ranma into my true love and we would live together happily ever after, or something like that. I mean, come on. We were destined to be together after all.

---

Ranma is laying on the couch, watching the movie still, though occasionally rolling his eyes nervously like a horse. Haruka is spooned up against him, hugging him from behind, watching the movie over his shoulder.

"Whatcha mean, 'destiny'?" a nervous Ranma asks.

Haruka answers smugly. "I mean we were meant to be together. When ever I'm around you, I can feel it. It's like a tingly feeling like when you bang your elbow..."

"...or a warm feeling in your stomach, like when you drink hot cocoa," Ranma finishes. Haruka's eyes get really wide.

---

And that was when I found out that Ranma felt it too: his destiny. Suddenly, it was like I wasn't alone anymore. I was so happy.

---

"YOU JERK!" Haruka is standing on the couch, waving a stunned Ranma around by his neck. His eyes are all little descending circles and both of his hands are in warding gestures. "WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME YOU COULD FEEL IT TOO?!"

---

Afterwards, we talked about it a bit. It was kind of strange, articulating what we've felt all of our lives. Kind of like describing the color 'red'. Just hard to do. But after we had made sure that we both felt the same thing, we talked about it some more.

And I discovered that I wasn't alone in more then one aspect: Ranma hated his destiny too.

I could only admire how he had fought it. When I tried to do something that wasn't my destiny, I would feel that 'this is not me' feeling in the back of my head. When I was racing, it was easiest to ignore. On everything else I tried, it slowly drove me away, but not with racing. I had discovered it recently, and it was still fresh and exciting. But Ranma had felt that, 'this is not me' feeling ever since he was a little kid. He just never let it effect him. He told me he was going to be the greatest martial artist ever, no matter what.

After that, we became even closer. We were fighting our future together. Him and me, versus the world. We developed a real deep bond, a close friendship.

---

"GIVE ME THAT LAST PIECE OF PIZZA!" a twelve year old Haruka shouts at a twelve year old Ranma. She is chasing him around the couch, him holding a pizza box and stuffing his face, her holding a bat and looking like she was about to join the ranks of the tomato heads. The room around them is trashed, and on the T.V. is some science fiction show involving spaceships.

---

It was about a week after that that Ranma had to leave again.

---

"Well," a twelve year old Ranma in a training uniform says, shifting a pack on his back nervously. "I got to go now."

"I know," a sad twelve year old Haruka in a sundress says. Near the two is a big man in a training uniform, glasses, and bandana. Genma, Ranma's father. He's looking impatient at the farewell, tapping his foot and looking at his wrist as though he had a watch on. "Bye, I guess."

Haruka turns around, and gets ready to walk away, when she is suddenly enveloped in a hug from behind by Ranma. She leans back a bit against him, and then turns around and returns the hug.

"Keep on fighting it, Ranma," she whispers in his ear.

"I will. You too, Haruka," he answers back, quietly in her ear too.

Behind the two the Genma is looking alarmed at the two getting so close. He starts to expound the lad on how much they need to hurry, but the two ignore him.

As they separate, Haruka leans forward and gives Ranma a quick and clumsy peck on the lips. Then, blushing red as a tomato, turns and runs away.

---

After that, things went back to a normal, if boring, routine. I would go to school due my work, and get about my business. I would rarely get to friendly, and this seemed to drive my classmates up the wall. Apparently it made me 'mysterious' and 'cool'. Lots of guys started to ask me out, but I always turned them down. I mean, when compared to Ranma, they were nothing special. That's not to say that I wasn't attracted. Oh no. I enjoyed a nice looking butt as much as the next girl, but it seemed meaningless if it wasn't Ranma's butt.

Ranma. He spoiled me for other men for the rest of my life. I guess it was about then that I started to notice girls as well as guys. I couldn't date other men, not as long as Ranma was still out there, but it seemed okay to get together with other women.

It was about then that I met Michiru. She had that calm mysterious and withdrawn thing going that I did too. She was very talented, a superb violinist, and a beautiful painter. We got to know each other, and quickly became good friends.

A little while later my family began to move around. I was dragged around with them, and got to visit other countries while I was growing up. When I hit eighth grade, I got my first car. It was a broken up jalopy, but it served me well for learning. After that one finally admitted to itself that it was dead, I got what I could for it, and supplemented that amount with some of my own to get the supped up convertible I have now.

I love my car.

It was at the beginning of my freshmen year that I returned to Japan. There I met up with Michiru again and discovered something.

She had a destiny, too.

A destiny that she had already surrendered to.

I don't know how I could tell she had surrendered to it. I just knew, when I next saw her, that she was different. That kind of spooked me. Made me feel nervous, somehow. We talked about it a couple of times, though I tried to avoid her for the most part. I told her that I would never give into it.

Then it happened.

---

A teenage Haruka in a jump suit and holding some kind of ridiculous looking stick with a symbol on it presses herself against the corner of a garage, trying to avoid the fight. In front of her is Sailor Neptune, battling some kind of scabrous creature that was possessing an innocent boy. The creature gets a lucky shot in, and launches Neptune to where Haruka stands.

Haruka looks in horror at the five claw stripes running down Neptune's back, and then a look of determination crosses her face. She holds up the transformation wand and shouts, "URANUS STAR POWER! MAKEUP!"

---

And that was that. I was swept up in my destiny. From the Messiah of Silence to the Sailor of Destruction I performed as my destiny had foreordained it. Looking back on my previous reluctance about my destiny, I suppose it was a bit childish. And I over came that childishness when I learned that lives depended on my destiny. I did what I had to.

It wasn't till after it most of it was over, after Galaxia, that I ran into Ranma again.

I had been attending a tournament for martial arts. I wasn't really participating, I was just there because our queen, Usagi, had commanded us all to get together and have a relaxing day. We were going to watch Makoto fight, and then go out and do some girl bonding stuff (I had secret plans involving luring the inners into a strip club, but that's beside the point). Anyway, all had been going well for Makoto, who had entered the tournament, when a new contestant entered at the last minute...

---

"GO GO GO! Kick him! Now hit him! Again! That's the stuff!" a seventeen year old Usagi shouts. She is standing on the sidelines of the mats. Behind her are the seven other scouts. Rei is giving Usagi mean looks, and attempting to get her to sit down. Ami is beside her, reading a book and occasionally exchanging words with Michiru who is behind her and watching the fight. Haruka is sitting next to Michiru, watching the fight and apparently not being to impressed by it. Minako is turned around in her chair and flirting with a pair of guys who are trying their best to ignore her and watch the fight. Hotaru is munching on an ice cream cone, and next to her is Setsuna, sipping her coffee slowly, apparently enjoying the taste. Makoto is on the mats exchanging blows with a guy twice her size, and winning.

"Not bad," an eighteen year old Haruka tells Michiru next to her.

"Indeed," Michiru answers. "It looks like she's improved quite a bit.

Makoto finishes off her opponent with a quick combination that forces him to step out of the ring. A judge on the sidelines blows a whistle. "Disqualification, due to exiting the combat arena. Winner: Makoto Kino."

Usagi on the side lines goes wild, and to shut her up Rei shoves an ice cream cone into her mouth. Like a baby with a bottle, Usagi starts to nurse at the cone instantly.

As Makoto goes over to her friends to gloat about her victory, a flurry of activity takes place at the judges stand. One of them gets up and takes a microphone to give an announcement. "There is a late challenger. Would you like to accept?" The last bit is directed at Makoto, who blink blinks, and then grins.

"Sure do! One more to knock down!" she replies, confidently. She straightens her judo uniform and takes her position, ready for the fight.

On the other end of the ring, a young man in a red Chinese shirt and black drawstring pants is being herded towards the ring.

"C'mon, mom. This is embarrassing! Why do I gotta fight in this tournament?"

"Now, now, dear. If you're ever going to get recognition as a martial artist, you'll have to participate in matches like these all the times," the woman herding the young man tells him. She has a peculiar wrapped bundle hanging off her shoulder, and the air of a woman who loved her son, just not when he was being foolish.

"Aww, man. I hope no one I know sees me. I'd never live it down," the young man mutters. He stops at the mat, bows to it, and removes his slippers before stepping onto it. He steps up to his position and turns to Makoto. "Now where's the guy I gotta fight?"

"I'm the new champion!" Makoto declares. While the young man had been approaching she had been eying him over hungrily. Apparently some of the other sailors have apparently begun to feel the lack of recent boyfriends, because Rei and Minako both give the young man similar stares. Haruka gives the boy a once over, before frowning and studying him more carefully, while Michiru continues her conversation with Ami. Hotaru, who now is about fourteen physically, also looks at the young man, though she provides a lot of her attention to finishing her food too. Setsuna gives him the hungry eye, but manages to hide it better than the rest (lots of time for practice).

Usagi doesn't even notice as she savages her ice cream.

The young man takes one look at Makoto, and then turns back to his mom. "Oh, come on, mom. Ya can't be serious!"

"Now son, what have I told you about being polite?" she scolds him, and he sighs before turning back to Makoto. Makoto has taken the apparent dismissal poorly, as she is now scowling fiercely at the boy. One of the judges announces the start of the fight, and Makoto attacks.

Makoto's attacks are fast and strong. They miss the young man by inches. She was focusing on not giving him enough time to collect himself, and apparently it was working, seeing as the young man hadn't even had the opportunity to take his hands out of his pockets. After a few minutes she is working him slowly back towards the edge of the fighting zone.

"Now, son," the woman from the side lines with the funny wrapped bundle. "It's impolite to play with your opponents."

"I just wanted her to feel like she was doing good," he protested. Rei, Michiru, Hotaru and Haruka all raise there eyebrows at that comment. Ami is still reading while Minako is drooling too much to notice. Usagi was desperately sucking the last bits of thawed ice cream off her fingers, and Setsuna was to lost in a private fantasy involving the young man and two cans of whip cream. On the inside. On the outside it looks like she is just calmly sipping her coffee.

"Well, I'm sure you let her feel good enough. But if you let it go to long, they might feel like you're playing with them, and that's how you make rivals," the woman admonished.

"Really? Wow. I guess I better finish it then," the young man answered, apparently taking the woman's words to heart. In a lightning fast motion his hands whip out of his pocket, slapping both of Makoto's fists away, leaving her open. Rather than strike, he just claps his hands in front of her face loudly. While she is flinching and blinking he leaps, clearing her head easily in a summersault. When Makoto opens her eyes, she is shocked to see that her opponent had apparently vanished. She was so shocked, that she loses her balance when she is tapped on the back by her opponent, and she slips and steps out of the ring.

Everyone in the crowd is quiet at this sudden display, having never seen anyone move that fast before. Rei, Michiru, Minako, and Hotaru's eyes are wide with shock. Haruka's have narrowed as she desperately wracks her mind to think why he looked so familiar. Setsuna had just added cherries to her fantasy, so never even noticed the move.

"What's everyone staring at?" Usagi asks, looking around and blinking.

"Very good son," the woman tells the young man. "Now, be polite and thank the young woman for the match. BE POLITE," she emphasizes carefully. The young man nods and offers his hand to the stunned Makoto, who is sitting on her butt outside the circle.

"Good fight," he tells her. The judges snap out of their shock, and one of them stands forward.

"Any further challengers?" A cricket chirps in the background, and a woman in the top row of the bleachers drops a pin (Unfortunately, no one heard the pin because it landed on the cricket). "Then I declare this young man to be the champion: Ranma Saotome!" The beginnings of applause starts, but is suddenly cut off as Haruka flying face faults off of her seat and lands on her face next to the mats (just missing them and hitting the cricket who is standing on the concrete. Luckily the needle was still under the bleacher).

"..." the young man's mother says.

"Hey! I recognize that fall! Is that you Haruka?" Ranma asks cheerfully.

---

Needless to say, there was much confusion. After I had managed to get control of myself, I offered a friendly greeting to Ranma...

---

"DIE!" Haruka shouts, launching herself at Ranma. He grins cheerfully, and the two begin a scuffle.

Members of the audience grow sweat drops.

---

...who returned with his own. We agreed to meet again to discuss old times.

---

Haruka and Ranma are separated, both of them with ripped clothes and covered in dirt. Ranma is grinning cheerfully, and Haruka has apparently recovered her calm, cool, and mysterious bearings. The effect is slightly ruined by her state of disrepair.

"Now I'm glad that you two know each other," Nodoka Saotome, Ranma's mother, tells the two of them. She is standing behind Ranma, and privately wondering who THIS violent woman was. She apparently decides that she's going to give her son a helping hand. After all, she'd hate for him to think he had to date this psychotic girl. He had had enough of that while he was forced to live with the Tendos. "But we really must be heading on. We have a lot to do and all..."

"Wanna go catch a movie, or somethin'?" Ranma asks cheerfully.

Nodoka face faults, but in a dignified manner, at the sight of her son taking the initiative with a woman.

Behind Haruka the other scouts are aligned to offer support. Ami had shut her book, and Hotaru had finished her ice cream. Setsuna had even come out of her naughty trance. They're all giving the boy in front of them skeptical stares. Who did he think he is? They wonder almost simultaneously. All of them except for Michiru, who is standing a little apart from the rest, and giving Ranma a far more intense inspection.

"I'm sorry, but Haruka is already seeing someone else, so..." Usagi starts up, deciding to give the boy a hint and get him out of here before Haruka eats him alive for trying to ask her out when...

"Sure," Haruka answers. All of the other scouts, except for Michiru, join Nodoka on the ground in a face fault. Michiru just gains a look of understanding.

As Ranma and Haruka walk away, Ranma with his hands behind his head and Haruka with her hands in her pocket, the others slowly start to stand up.

"Say," Ranma asks cheerfully. "Ya got enough money for a pizza?"

"Shut up, Ranma," Haruka answers, not shouting.

Everyone re-faults.

---

We caught a quick movie...

---

A martial art flick is playing on a movie screen. Ranma is snickering openly at some of the moves, while Haruka is busy trying to grab some popcorn from a bag that Ranma is holding. He keeps moving it at the last instant, apparently without realizing it. Haruka's face is slowly getting redder and redder.

"Hey," Ranma says between snickers. "This is pretty funny. Want some popcorn?"

Haruka apparently loses her self control.

"DIE!"

---

...and then had some pizza. While we were there, we talked about old times. Ranma was a little vague about his past, saying something about a ten year long training trip in the martial arts with his dad. After that, he somehow got even vaguer, before saying that after an 'incident' involving some of his friends, he had gone to live with his mother. She was apparently trying to grill manners and basic social skills into him. She had apparently succeeded admirably.

---

Haruka and Ranma are sitting in a pizza parlor. As Haruka is taking a sip of her soda, Ranma opens his mouth to shove the entire slice of pizza into it, before pausing, looking sheepish, and taking only half of it in an entire bite. He then chews with his mouth closed.

---

He also revealed his curse to me, so to prevent confusion later on.

---

THUNK.

Haruka is seated in her chair with it laying flat on its back in a dead feint. A red headed and female Ranma holding an empty glass of water sweat drops.

---

After I recovered from the shock, I managed to handle it in a mature fashion.

---

Haruka has her hands out and is squeezing Ranma-chan's breasts (Author's note: I hate using Japanese lingo in an English language fic, but for the sake of convenience I will refer to female Ranma as Ranma-chan). A thin line of drool is trailing down her chin.

"Ah, Haruka? I think you know they're real now. Could you, ah, stop? Please?" Ranma-chan asks nervously, twitching in response to the squeezes.

---

I in turn gave him an edited version of my life. It was during this that I realized something. I had surrendered to my destiny. Despite the fact that I had almost sworn to Ranma that I would fight it, here I was: a scout. I was suddenly ashamed of myself. I could still feel the fact that Ranma was fighting his destiny. I could feel my destiny again when I was around him, and it didn't feel like it had when Michiru had confessed to me that she had surrendered.

I was suddenly terrified that he would realize that I wasn't fighting. I had no idea how he would react. Would he understand? Feel betrayed? How would it change things?

I quickly found an excuse to end the evening, so that I could have some time to think about it.

---

A calm looking Haruka looks casually at the wall of the pizza restaurant. "Oh, look at the time! I have to be heading home!" she exclaims.

Ranma pauses halfway through a bite. He looks at the wall, and his cheerful expression turns puzzled. "Um, Haruka? That's not a real clock. All it has on it is 'time for chili', and the hands turn around constantly."

Tiny sweat drops appeared all over the back of Haruka's head.

---

We exchanged numbers and addresses, and I made good my escape.

After I made my way home, I was confronted by the other scouts, who had apparently decided to wait up and quiz me on my strange actions.

---

"Who is he?" Rei demanded.

"How did he beat me so fast?" Makoto shouts.

"How do you know him?" Ami politely inquires.

"Is he single?" Everyone turns and gives Minako a look. "Heh heh," she chuckles nervously. "I meant, is he safe?"

"What about Michiru?" Usagi asks.

Everyone froze at that one, and turns to look at the aqua haired scout. She looks at the others for a second, before cocking her head to one side and looking back at Haruka. "He's cute. Good luck!" she tells her cheerfully.

Hotaru looks up from where she's doing school work in her room as the house shakes from the combined face faults of the inner scouts.

---

I kind of get sick of peoples assumptions on my relation ship to Michiru. Allow me to take a second from the story to explain it.

Me and Michiru are, for lack of a better term, best friends. We are closer than friends, closer than siblings, and closer than lovers. In fact, we have on the occasion participated in sex together. That does not mean that she's the love of my life.

In the old days of the previous Silver Millennium we would be forced to fight together constantly. We lived very far from almost any other person. The only time we would really get to be around others is when we were forced to attend palace functions or required extra guards to help us in our fights. Because of this we have come to rely on and understand each other very well. When we were born, we retained a lot of that closeness. In fact, it became reinforced. She was the only one out there that understood what we were doing, how much it hurt to have to be willing to make sacrifices. We had only each other to offer comfort to ourselves. Sometimes that comfort would be verbal, like a good job, or a bout or rationalization. Sometimes the strain of being alone, divided from everyone else would become to much, and we would comfort each other physically as well.

I love her. I really do. But that doesn't mean I can't love someone else as well. She understands that, and though she is a hardcore lesbian, she won't hold it against me if I fall for a guy as well (Of course, at the time of all this, the fact that Ranma could be a girl some of the time hadn't escaped me. I found myself wondering if I could convince Ranma to try something...different...).

The other scouts didn't understand this completely, but they just chalked it up to some kind of outer scout mandatory sexual deviance thing. After they had gotten over this, I told them to wait till tomorrow and to have a scout meeting. It would save time and I could tell everyone about it at once. Also, I had to admit, I had a few questions I needed to ask.

It was his destiny. The only other people I had known about that had had destinies were me and Michiru. Both of us had ended up scouts. Did that mean that Ranma was going to be a scout too? Or did it just mean that he was going to become something important?

At the meeting, after I had told what I knew, I got my answers.

---

"It sounds to me like he might be the Sky Prince," Artemis declares. He is sitting on a table next to Luna. Arrayed around them are all the other scouts, looking at the two with interest. Except for Setsuna, who was currently boozed up and passed out by the time gate after a night of REAL partying.

"Yes, indeed. I think Artemis might be right," Luna confirmed.

"The Sky Prince?" Usagi asked.

"Well, he was kind of like Prince Endymon. They both came from Earth originally, though the Sky Prince didn't stay there. Instead he traveled all over the solar system, eventually leaving it all together to wander through the other stars. When he came back, he was a very calm and quiet man. He didn't like to fight that much, and was very learned. The epitome of scholars."

The other girls are all nodding, enraptured by the story. Haruka is actually getting an extremely skeptical look on her face, and has grown sweat drops. She is internally trying to picture Ranma as a quiet scholar that hates fighting. Trying really hard...

Artemis takes over for Luna and continues the story. "He used to spend a lot of time out in the edges of the solar system. He like to have long debates with Sailor Pluto, one of the few out there that knew enough to argue with him for any period of time."

At the time gates, Setsuna sneezes, burps, scratches herself, and rolls over.

"While on his trips to and from Pluto," Luna starts in again, "he would stop by and converse with the other outer scouts quite a bit. No one ever really knew the full extent of his relationship with them..." her the black cat trails off, and everyone gives Haruka a strange look. She calmly bears it, though inside she's still trying to picture a scholarly Ranma. She almost had one...

"Anyway," Artemis finishes. "He stayed and tried his hardest to aid us during our battle with Beryl, using his knowledge of medicine and mechanics to aid the soldiers. The queen even granted him with a transformation wand not unlike yours. Unfortunately, he fell like you, scouts, and died in the final onslaught. He must have been sent forwards with the rest of you."

Silence reigns for a moment.

Haruka tries one more time to picture Ranma as a scholar...

"Now," says Luna. "I wonder what would be the best way to try and wake up his past incarnation?"

---

That had caught my attention. They hadn't even met the guy yet, and already they were planning on getting him to join the team. I tried to explain to them that Ranma didn't want his destiny...

---

The other scouts are sitting around a table, staring at Haruka, who looks like she had just finished talking.

"So..." Luna began, and then trailed off.

"...he doesn't..." Rei started, sounding puzzled.

"...want to become... Makoto also seemed perplexed.

"...a scout?" Ami finished, in a thoughtful tone.

"I don't get it," Usagi declared.

"He's just reluctant," decided Artemis.

"Yea," Minako says. "He'll thank us when we're finished."

"Right!" all the other girls declare, except for Haruka. She looks around at the other girls who have already started arguing about the best way to force Ranma into excepting a transformation wand, and sighs heavily, sweat drop forming on the back of her head.

---

...but they were less then receptive to the idea.

Even though, I was slightly awed by how thoroughly Ranma seemed to have escaped his destiny. In the past he had been quiet, peaceful, and well educated. Now he was a superbly skilled, crass, and ignorant martial artist. Despite the fact that he was almost the exact opposite of his previous incarnation, I still found myself attracted to him.

After having my objections shot down, I left the meeting when one of them suggested that they dress up in monster costumes to try to scare him into excepting.

On arriving home, I met up with Michiru. She had apparently taken a message from Ranma, detailing his wish to meet with me at the park. That began a series of wonderful dates between him and myself.

---

Haruka and Ranma-chan are walking through the park. Haruka is holding an ice cream cone with a single scoop in one hand, and trying not to stare at Ranma-chan who is holding an ice cream cone in both hands, each one piled with five different flavors. Ranma-chan is looking very smug, and behind them is an ice cream vendor with great big hearts in his eyes.

-

Ranma is standing next to a thin plastic wall with an advertisement for some generic brand of motor oil. Behind him is a large crowd of people yelling and waving their arms around, and in front of him is a dirt bike track. Ranma is cheering madly, and Haruka is flying through the air after jumping from a pile of dirt on her bike.

-

Ranma and Haruka are kneeling at a table laden down with food. Nodoka is chattering away, apparently telling an embarrassing story about Ranma's childhood, because Ranma is blushing and has his hand covering his face. Haruka is laughing along with Nodoka.

-

Ranma and Haruka are laying on the floor, all twisted about. Haruka has one arm placed on Ranma's neck, and the other hand poised in the air about to unleash a punch. Ranma has one hand pushing up at Haruka's face so that she has to have her head turned up, and his other hand ready to catch her strike. Both of them have frozen, apparently mid-fight, and are watching a b-grade horror movie on the T.V. Behind them, in the doorway, Michiru, Setsuna, and Hotaru are all standing with sweat drops evident on all of them.

-

Ranma is passed out on a couch, laying on his belly, with one hand under his chin and the other draped off the couch, snoring. Haruka is laying on her back on his back. One hand is cradling a remote controller to her chest, the other is draped down the side of the couch near Ranma's.

Michiru enters, wearing a bathrobe and rubbing her eyes. She looks at the couch, and when she finds the two of them there, she grins mischievously. Five minute later Michiru is slowly removing Haruka's pants as she lays sleeping. A minute after that, Haruka's blouse and bra are also removed. A giggling Michiru leaves the room with the stolen clothes leaving Haruka wearing nothing but a pink pair of panties with little blue hearts on them.

---

(Man did I have a surprise when I woke up to that last one) It was like we were kids again. Slowly I stopped getting nervous about what would happen if Ranma found out about me giving into destiny. I started hoping, selfishly, that he would too. That he would give in to destiny, and stay with me forever.

I brought it up around him once, to find out how he would react.

---

Haruka and Ranma are seen together sitting on the end of a bench outside a skating rink. As they are strapping on their skates, Haruka asks casually, "Say, Ranma. Do you still feel your destiny?"

Ranma is concentrating hard on the laces, and answers without really thinking. "Yea. All the time."

"Still hate it?" she asks, giving him a covert glance.

"Yup." He has finished mastering his skates, and he stands up, slowly and shakily.

Haruka hides her face with her hair for a moment, quietly, and then gets up too. She moves easily on her skates, and heads out quickly for the rink. Ranma follows after, slowly.

---

I was lucky that he was so distracted and didn't really take in my questions. He was kind of short on subtlety himself, and I think because of that he wasn't very good at reading other people. It was amazing how many little things he missed around other people.

Especially in the romantic sense.

---

"So, here we are," Haruka announces. They are in the park, in a small copse of trees. Ranma is whistling cheerfully, looking around at his surroundings.

"Wow!" he says. "What a neat place! Why, it's so well hidden no one could see it unless they walked in on it! And its far enough away from the path that nobody could hear you if you shout! I bet this is a great place to be alone!"

Haruka is giving him a strange look as he continues on in that line. Finally, she shrugs it off, and begins to move in for the thrill...I mean kill.

As she slowly sneaks up on him, unbuttoning the top couple of buttons on her shirt, he apparently doesn't notice, and recommences whistling. Finally, when she's right behind him she moves, swooping in for a quick hug. He chooses just that moment to bend over. Brushing aside a couple of leaves, he pulls a half buried quarter out of the dirt.

"Look what..." he trails off as when he turns around he comes face to face with the image of Haruka frozen in the act of embracing a tree, with her face half smashed into it. Ranma grows a sweat drop.

---

After several frustrating encounters, I confronted Nodoka with my problem, and she was... sympathetic...to my cause.

---

"Now, now. My son is wonderful person, but a little slow on the uptake on that kind of thing," Nodoka ensures an embarrassed looking Haruka. She continues. "Your best bet for seducing my son is to probably lay on his bed, naked, surrounded by rose petals, and with the room lit only by candles." She pauses for a moment to think, not realizing that Haruka is now firmly planted face first into the ground, her fingers extended in warding gestures. "You should probably put a sign up that says 'make love to me' as well," she concluded.

---

When I turned to Michiru for aid, she was about as helpful.

---

"HAHAHAHAHAHAH," Michiru rolls on the ground, clutching her sides with tears pouring out of her eyes. Haruka stands on sidelines, her fist held up right and shaking, while little veins start to pop out all over her forehead.

---

Despite the numerous hardships I faced, I persevered.

---

"Hey Haruka, thanks for inviting me over for a movie," Ranma cheerfully greets Haruka from her front porch. Haruka is wearing a pair of short shorts and a button up shirt that really should have more buttons done up.

"Sure," she says graciously. "We got the house all to ourselves tonight. Michiru is out of town for a concert, Setsuna is pulling an all nighter, and Hotaru is at Chibi-Usa's house for the night." The front door closes ominously behind Ranma as he enters.

"Wow," Ranma's voice can be heard from the outside. "This sure is a lot' a sake!"

-

"Oh, hey Haruka!" Ranma greets her, crossing the corridor that runs down the center of the mall. "Are ya shopping?"

"As a matter a fact, I am," she answers. "Could you give me some help? I'm buying lingerie and I need someone to give me some opinions."

-

"Haruka!" Ranma shouts cheerfully from his place in the dojo behind his house. He looks away from where he's pounding the ever living crap out of an innocent post to smile at Haruka as she enters the dojo.

Haruka herself is dressed in a training uniform. A uniform very tight in the pants. With the front mostly open. And nothing on underneath. "Ranma," she starts calmly. "How about some grappling?"

---

After I had tried several times, I finally decided to accept the fact that Ranma apparently wasn't interested in a physical relationship at the moment. I came to the mature conclusion that my best bet was to take it slowly.

---

A nervous looking Haruka kneels in a loose shirt on one corner of a futon. A twitch has developed in one eye, and her hair is all messed up.

"There, there," Michiru tells her. She looks totally out of her depths. "I'm sure he'll come around eventually. Here, have some soup."

---

I had to admit though, that I was curious about why Ranma seemed so reluctant to become involved in a physical relationship. When I confronted Ranma with this I got an ambiguous answer that dodged the question.

---

"Physical relationship? What do ya mean by that?"

---

So I turned instead to Nodoka. She in turn gave me a much fuller account of Ranma's previous life up until his coming to live with his mother.

---

"Ranma, dear," Nodoka calls out, sounding worried.

"Yea, mom?" Ranma poked in his head to check on what his mother needed.

"I think I need your help. You see, she hasn't moved in nearly two hours," Nodoka said in a concerned tone of voice. She nods over to where Haruka is currently laying on the ground, her eyes glazed over and with both hands presenting the warding gestures.

"Um," Ranma said, growing a sweat drop. "Give her another twenty minutes. If she still ain't up by then, douse her with some cold water. That's what usually gets me out of it." He pulls his head back out of the room and gets back to practicing.

One of Haruka's eyes start to twitch.

---

After I had found up what I was truly up against, I took a moment to rethink my approach on the matter. Finally, a course of action presented itself. It was risky, and could very easily backfire, but I was willing to try it anyway.

---

"It's nice of your mother to let you have the house to yourself, Ranma," Haruka tells him. They are sitting in front of the T.V. on a couch, though this time in Ranma's house. It has a more traditional feel to it than Haruka's, but despite the sliding doors is fully equipped with modern appliances. Haruka is dressed in comfortably fitting pants and a shirt with the tail tied up, exposing her midriff.

"Mom is great," Ranma agreed. He's wearing standard Chinese shirt with drawstring pants. The T.V. is playing a martial arts/comedy film, the same one they had watched when they were younger, and they're both watching it. Haruka is sending little glances over at Ranma, though he doesn't notice, and appears to be slowly building up her courage for something.

"Want me to get some popcorn?" she asks suddenly. Ranma starts, and than looks at her and nods.

"Sure! If you want to," he encourages her. She gets up and moves out of the room. Ranma turns his attention back to the T.V.

"Ranma?" Haruka asks from behind his head. He sits up, but doesn't turn around.

"Yea?" he asks.

"Do you remember what I said, when we were watching this last?"

"Yea, I think. Didn't you say something about this being destiny?"

"Yes. That was it. And you say that you hate destiny?"

"Ye-" Ranma stops suddenly, apparently thinking about his words. "I hate it when destiny tries to force me into doing stuff I don't like. But when stuff like this happens, when I like doing them, I don't mind as much. I mean, when I like what destiny says has to happen, then I don't fight it that hard." He stops, thinking for a second. "Why do ya wanna know?" He turns his head to look at Haruka. She is kneeling behind the couch, so that only her head is visible.

"So," she begins. "You don't mind it when destiny makes you do things like this?" She leans forward a bit, and kisses him on the forehead.

He starts, his eyes getting panicked for a second, and then he calms down. "Well... Not really," he admits slowly.

"How about when it makes you do something like this?" and this time Haruka leans in and gives him a kiss on the lips. At first Ranma freezes up, and presents the warding gestures. After a second, he relaxes a bit. Haruka breaks it off, and watches him again.

"..." Ranma doesn't say anything for a second, lost in thought.

"Or how about when destiny makes you do something like this?" Haruka asks, and jumps over the couch. "DIE!" A dust cloud quickly forms around the scuffling two.

-

The movie is now over, and the T.V. is playing only static. The sofa had at some point been knocked on its back, and the rest of the room is in shambles. The lights are dim (Most of the lamps having been knocked over) and Haruka and Ranma are laying on the floor. Ranma is laying on top of Haruka, pinning her legs with his. He has both of her hands held on the floor above her head, keeping her from moving. He is barely out of breath. Haruka is pinned on the ground, with most of her clothes either torn, dirty, or twisted in a revealing fashion. She is breathing very hard.

"There," Ranma declares. "Finally. Now what are ya going to do?" He apparently hasn't realized their position yet.

"Well," Haruka whispers, still breathing hard. She very slowly begins to rub her self against him. "I can think of a few things..." she trails off, her voice husky and suggestive.

"Yea," Ranma agrees. His voice has also become soft. "So can I..." Haruka slowly begins to move her face upwards, her lips approaching his carefully, her breath delicate, her chest heaving...

"I'm going to go get some snacks," Ranma says, getting up and heading to the kitchen. Somehow, Haruka manages a flying face fault when all ready laying on the floor. While she's laying there, both hands presenting warding gestures, her hair sticking straight out, and her eyes twirling, Ranma comes back in. He leans down and gives her a quick kiss on the lips, before going back to check on the pizza he had put in the microwave.

Haruka recovers from her face fault, and touches her lips, looking after him.

---

While it hadn't worked as well as I might have hoped it would, bringing up our destiny like that, it also didn't backfire.

---

It is very late, and all the lights have been turned off, except the T.V., which is playing more static. Ranma is laying asleep on the couch, stretched out on top of it. One of his legs is tossed over an arm rest while the other is off the couch and laying on the ground. One of his arms is also laying on the ground, while the other is tossed over his eyes. He's snoring slightly.

Haruka is standing over him, once more touching her lips, and watching him. She has a wistful and affectionate expression on her face. After standing for a moment, she nods to herself. She turns off the T.V. and fetches a blanket from a corner. After settling herself down, laying on top of him, she adjusts the blanket over both of them. Ranma shifts in his sleep, and the arm that was over his head descends down over her instead. She smiles and closes her eyes to get some sleep.

---

And so we passed the time. It was a wonderful (if frustrating in certain aspects) time. But underneath it all was a tension. I could feel it building slowly, a crescendo of pressure. It was like... what's that old expression? "You can't fight destiny?" Well, Ranma had fought it for a long time, and eventually, it caught up with him.

The entire event occurred on the day that I was introducing Ranma to Michiru. They had run into each other occasionally, when he had come over to the house I share with her and the other outers, but they had never spent any amount of time in each other's company. I had decided to try to get the two of them to know each other better.

---

"Hello! My name's Ranma!" Ranma cheerfully declares, extending his hand towards the woman in front of him. He's dressed in standard Ranma gear.

"And mine is Michiru. A pleasure," she answered, giving him a warm smile in return. She's in a well fitting but conservatively cut dress.

---

The two hit it off great. Ranma is a nice person, and I think Michiru could feel it. Michiru usually comes off as mysterious and perhaps a bit superior and arrogant. It has a habit that had made her very popular as a kind of idol, but didn't help her make many close friends. Ranma of course completely missed that. The two of them were going with me to another racing competition, outside of town about an hour's trip. The team I was racing on had taken care of transportation of my bike, and the three of us were driving out to the track inmy convertible. On the trip, I pulled over so that Ranma could give a quick demonstration of his curse to Michiru without getting water all over my seats. She handled it much the same way I did.

---

THUNK! Ranma-chan is holding an empty thermos that had once contain cold water in it, standing in front of a now prone Michiru who had thrown dignity to the wind and fainted.

---

Afterwards, we agreed that it would be best for Ranma to stay that way until we reached the track, seeing as how the thermos with the warm water had apparently cooled down to much to change him back.

---

Haruka, Michiru, and Ranma-chan are all in Haruka's car going at high speeds over sharp turns. Haruka and Michiru are in the front, and Ranma-chan is cheerfully splayed out on the back seat, sitting right between both of them with his arms extended over the two empty seats.

Michiru has her eyes glued to the rearview mirror. She gives the road in front of them a quick look, and than leans over to whisper in Haruka's ear. Haruka starts, and than grins wickedly. As they take the next turn, Haruka swerves a bit to run over a rather deep pothole.

"Whoa!" Ranma-chan yelps in the back as they hit the bump. As the car shakes, both Michiru and Haruka's eyes are glued to the rearview mirror, and the sight of an uninhibited Ranma-chan's breasts bouncing. Michiru licks her lips, before self consciously wiping her mouth with the back of her hands. Haruka turns her attention back to the road, searching for more potholes.

---

We arrived at the track, and things went about as expected. For various reasons, Ranma put off changing back into a guy until after the race itself was finished...

---

Michiru is sitting in a quiet and collected fashion in her seat next to Ranma-chan. Ranma is up out of her seat, cheering and yelling support for Haruka. Michiru is facing straight forward, but out of the corner of her eyes she can just make out the bouncing Ranma-chan. In Ranma-chan's hands are a hotdog and a soft drink. The vendor's in the stands are all hovering near the unaware Ranma-chan with hearts in their eyes.

---

...and after he had changed himself back, he and Michiru went to congratulate me on winning the race.

---

"Great race, Haruka! You won by a mile!" he yells cheerfully. He starts to jog over to where Haruka is taking off her helmet by her bike. One of the mechanics for a losing racer scowls at him, and accidentally' turns a while carrying a long pipe. As it's about to hit Ranma, he casually swats it out of the way. As a result of the swat, the mechanic goes spinning around three times before falling on his ass. Ranma doesn't even notice. Michiru steps over the fallen mechanic carefully before continuing at a more sedate pace to where Ranma is cheerfully telling Haruka how great she was. The mechanic gets up afterwards and stagers off, dizzy, to get some water.

---

Now, even though we had defeated all the major enemies, like Beryl and Galaxia and the others, that doesn't mean that there weren't other evil creatures around. Like that Snow Princess, or a couple of other minor demons that escape from various seals. Usually one or two of the inners is enough to take out that kind of threat, but they do pop out occasionally.

---

"ROAR! I am Hey Tred! I have come to destroy you!" a voice yells. Haruka, Michiru, and Ranma all turn around, curious looks on their faces, to be swatted aside by a strange looking demon. It bears a resemblance to a gorilla crossed with a grizzly bear.

---

And that's when it happened.

---

"What the hell..." Ranma's exclamation is cut off as suddenly a glow of light appears in a column in front of him. He stares, wide eyed, as a transformation wand slowly forms itself in the center of the light. Awestruck, he slowly reaches for it...

---

If I just kept my mouth shut, he would have reached out and grabbed it, and then his destiny would be made. I wanted him to do it, so that he would be with me forever, as is out destiny.

However, if I were to let him take it out of ignorance, I would never have been able to forgive myself.

---

"Stop!" Haruka shouts, knocking the wand away from his hand. It fell out of the light, clattering to the ground next to Ranma. He looks shocked, like he's coming out of a trance or something.

"Wha..." he begins, sounding muddled.

"Ranma Saotome. If you touch that wand, than you will never be able to run from your destiny again. You would forever be changed. As I was," Haruka tells him, looking down at where he was still kneeling. She pulls her wand out, and holds it up. "Uranus Star Power! Makeup!"

Standing a little ways off, Michiru nods, and pulls her wand out as well. "Neptune Star Power! Makeup!"

Ranma stares, wide eyed as the two transform. Sailor Neptune nods to Sailor Uranus and moves to distract the demon. Uranus turns back to the wide eyed Ranma. "I took up my wand when it was offered to me, so that I could protect others," she whispers. Ranma's expression closes in on itself. His face is entirely unreadable. "But you, you have a choice. If you leave the wand where it is, if you throw it away, it will never return to you. You will be forever free of your destiny." With that, Uranus joins Neptune in the fight.

Ranma alternates his attention between the wand and the fight, indecision the only expression on his face.

---

Now, the monster really wasn't that powerful. Yes, it was strong, but together we could have taken it. However, it did have a few tricks up its sleeve, and it made those known to us in an inconvenient fashion.

---

"Auuugghhh!" Neptune cries as she is knocked backwards.

"Hmph," Uranus grunts as she too is blasted back. She hits the ground bad, and bounces with the impact. She is about to hit the ground again and roll, when she suddenly finds herself cradled in a soft pair of hands. She looks up, startled, and finds herself looking into Ranma's face. In one arm he holds Uranus, and in the other, he holds the transformation wand. He takes a deep breath, and then looks over at the monster. He nods to himself, and than, holding the wand up into the air, as Uranus' eyes open wide,...

---

My breath caught in my throat. Was he about to surrender himself to destiny? Would he join me and Michiru, the rest of the outers, and the inners?

Would he be with me forever?

---

...and than Ranma slowly crushes the wand with one hand. He tosses the shattered remains to the side.

"I am Ranma," he declares. "Ranma Saotome of the Anything Goes school of Martial Arts. That is the only person I am."

---

And that was that, I thought. He had escaped destiny. I was happy for him, that he had managed to get away.

And I was sad as well.

---

Uranus stands up from Ranma's arms.

"I understand," she tells him, averting her eyes so that he couldn't see them, and that she couldn't see him. "If you're not going to fight, you must flee quickly. Me and Neptune can take care of this." She starts to walk away, when her arm is suddenly caught. Giving a quick look back, she sees Ranma with a cocky smirk on his face.

"I never said I wasn't gonna fight," he tells her. And then he enters the brawl.

---

At first I was astonished that any regular human, no matter how long they had been practicing martial arts. I initially tried to get him out of the fight. After he demonstrated his proficiency, I withdrew a bit so that I could study his techniques and skills.

---

Ranma and Hey Tred are fighting. The battle has moved its way from the garage area to the track where the racing itself had taken place.

"Katsu Tenshin Amaguriken!"

Uranus and Neptune are standing at the edge of the track, slouched down and staring, bug eyed and gape jawed.

"Uranus, how did he do that?" Neptune asks.

"I have no idea," Uranus answers.

"Mouko Takabishiya!"

"Uranus, how did he do that?"

"I have no idea."

"Hiryu Shoten Ha!"

"Uranus..."

"No idea."

---

And during that fight, I felt ashamed of myself somehow. I had surrendered, given into what I thought was inevitable. And here was Ranma: uncompromising and victorious nonetheless. I didn't know how to react. I didn't know how he'd react. Would he scorn me for giving up? Would he want anything to do with me?

When the fight finally ended, the monster dissolving into dust and a victorious Ranma coming back to us, I held my breath in nervous fear.

---

Neptune and Uranus, having apparently recovered from the fight, and are standing at the edge of the track, trying to salvage their dignity by at least looking cool. Ranma is crossing the shattered remains of the track, dusting his hands off. His clothes are ripped and dirtied from the fight, almost beyond repair. His face is cold and expressionless.

He stops when he gets within five feet of the two scouts. Neither scout speaks, waiting to see what the following confrontation would shape up to be.

"Haruka," Ranma begins slowly, his eyes covered by his bangs. Uranus swallows barely, and sets herself, ready for whatever he might have to say. "I'm hungry. Want to go for pizza?" he declares, looking up and smiling cheerfully. Neptune crashes to the ground in a face fault behind the fence. Uranus tries to remain dignified, but she can't control her smile, or the tears of relief that start flowing from her eyes. She tackles Ranma in a hug, and he returns it, though he looks a little nervous about holding a woman wearing a skirt that short and a shirt that tight.

---

And that was that. Even though he had escaped, even though he would never be a scout, he was still mine. He was mine, destiny or not.

After that, things went on.

---

"Hey, Haruka! My mom said you wanted to see me! And what's with all the flower petals on the stairs?" Ranma opens the door to his room and walks in. "Hey, what's with all the candles? And why are you in my bed under my sheets? Is that a sign on the wall over there? What's it say...?"

The End.


End file.
